Rain
by ilexx
Summary: Season 1. After Banks of the Lethe.


I don't own Andromeda.

Set right after Banks of the Lethe.**  
**

**Rain**

Hydroponics were but sparsely lit, a bit cool and wet, the air impregnated by a tepid drizzle that drenched the rich, dark soil, the patches of grass, the flowers, the bushes and trees, the scent of it all assaulting Beka's nostrils in an aggressive, albeit pleasant manner. Which didn't prevent her from muttering curses against the drops reaching and wetting her just as they did with the plants. She truly hated weather, real weather on planets, simulated weather in Hydroponics... It really didn't matter.

It took a few seconds for her eyes to adjust to the semi-darkness, it took her even longer to spot his frame, seated at the far end of the huge hall under a tree that looked a bit like an umbrella, but didn't seem to provide much shelter from the water. He looked drenched to the skin, his hair smacked to his skull, the uniform wrinkled and a bit muddy, but he didn't seem to care. He was staring straight ahead, his hands hanging loosely between his bent knees. He was well aware of her presence, but he didn't move, nor did he speak up.

"Here you are," she said quietly, looking awkwardly around before she finally decided to settle down next to him with a sigh. It was exactly as damp and uncomfortable as she had expected. "I've been looking for you all over the ship..."

"Well, you've found me now. Rommie always knows where I am," Dylan answered hoarsely, in a distant, uninviting tone.

"I'm well aware of that," Beka told him, her voice sharper than intended. She immediately bit her tongue. This was truly no time to pick a fight with him. "Anyway, I just wanted you to know that we..." She hesitated slightly. "We've decided to postpone the party over the Perseid decision until..." Another brief pause, but then she continued: "Until we can all celebrate together."

He sighed almost inaudibly. Turning his head, he threw her for the first time since she had entered a direct look.

"You don't have to do that," he said lowly.

"We want to."

He attempted a brief smile, that turned more into a quick, one-sided twitch of his mouth, while he again averted his eyes away from her inquiring glance.

She waited, but there was no further remark from him. Some minutes further down the night it became quite clear that there would not be anything more coming from him at all. Respecting his wish for solitude, Beka stood up, looked down on him with a slight nod and began to slowly walk away. But then she stopped and turned around, approaching him again and cowering in front of him.

"Dylan..." Her voice caught in her throat, sounding raspy. She cleared it, coughing lowly. "I just wanted to say 'thanks' and..." She stopped again, seeing him close his eyes and slightly lowering his head to the side, a brief flash of raw, undamped pain running over his features.

"Thanks for what?" he muttered, almost choking. Beka felt her own eyes burning dryly: she had lost enough people in her own life to know exactly how and what he felt. But knowing of and witnessing vulnerability of somebody one was just beginning to feel responsible for, had always been two very different matters for her.

"For coming back," she answered him straight, though. "I wanted to say 'thanks' and that I'm sorry that you had to leave Sarah behind," she added quickly, before he could interrupt her. She felt the stinging of tears in her eyes and closed her lids, letting the drops slide from beneath them. It didn't matter in the drizzle, her face was wet anyway, he wouldn't notice. But he did.

"Are you crying?" he asked lowly. "On my behalf?"

She shook her head silently, pressing her palms against her eyes.

"There is no need, Beka. I'll be all right, I just..." He paused briefly. "I need some time to learn to accept it, to live with it."

"I guess I'm crying both on behalf of you and me..." she told him, her words muffled, her face still hidden behind her fingers. "I've lost people myself. I know that it hurts. I guess that I'm crying for all the times when I should've cried and couldn't. It's odd, since she's a warship, but for the first time here on the _Andromeda _I'm enough at peace to cry for things that hurt..."

They spent some time in silence before he spoke again.

"I just didn't know..."

"That it'd hurt?" she asked with a last sniff.

"I knew it'd hurt, but... I'm surprised, I guess: I simply didn't know it would hurt that much."

She let her hands sink and looked at him, a mixture of feelings shining through her tears: regret, compassion, understanding.

"Things always have a way of hurting more than we thought they would..." she whispered.

"Yes," he agreed, "but that's different: every shape, every colour, every nuance I thought I knew by heart is becoming indistinguishable, uncertain, everything I've tried to build up is undone, all is broken..." His voice died off. He shut up. Reflected. Then shook his head. "I just don't know. I don't know how to do this. It isn't something I can run away from. It isn't something I can fight. It isn't something I can ignore. It's... I used to think that no evil would ever be really able to touch the Commonwealth, get close enough to my family, Sarah... us - to **me**. And now everywhere I look, every direction I turn to, I can see nothing but disaster..."

"Then don't look around. Take your time and look only ahead and back instead. Remembering doesn't have to be a life-sentence, you know. You can turn it into a new goal, a second chance, a promise to fulfil..."

He looked at her with doubting, slightly blood-shot eyes. She smiled at him.

"There," she told him gently, "I'm no longer crying. It's time you stop too, you know. Get a grip. In these times nobody likes a sissy. Not for too long, anyway..." she added, her soft tone belying the harshness of her words.

"Nobody liked a sissy in the old times, either. And I **wasn't **crying," Dylan contradicted her stubbornly, pushing himself up from the ground and scrambling to his feet.

"No?" Beka asked him, her voice clearly indicating that she didn't believe him, while she fell into step next to him. "What were you then?"

He shrugged, suddenly seeming a bit embarrassed, wavering between a still circumspect attitude and his wish to confide in this almost stranger who suddenly appeared able to relate. Noticing, she smiled.

"What were you, Dylan?"

"Just... Just watering the rain..."


End file.
